March Fourth Marching Band
Yesterday I went to see a band called March Fourth (named after the day of their first gig), and they were quite awesome. They're a combination of a marching band and a troupe of carnival performers. Tons of energy. If you ever get a chance to go see them, do so. Especially if you can do it for free like I did at the Saturday Market here in downtown Portland. I had a lot of fun sketching the various band members in their eclectic costumes, but it was very difficult because of how much they were moving around.
The highlight of the choreography had to be a song which was accompanied by the people on stilts moving some people on the ground like marionettes. At first, they were completely yielding, doing exactly what the puppeteers wanted them to. But as the dance went on, they would start to take their own initiative, and throw in small movements. They began to grab the strings that controlled them, and soon enough they were controlling themselves more than being controlled. At the finale, as the music got faster and faster, the marionettes ripped themselves free, string by string, and began circling around the puppeteers. The people on stilts ended up tied in the very strings that controlled their puppets at the beginning. Quite awesome.